Valerie Bertinelli thought she knew her paternal grandfather — until she traced her ancestry and discovered that he was harboring some big secrets.
The actor appeared on Season 10 of latest episode of PBS' hit series "Finding Your Roots" and made two shocking revelations while chatting with host Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Valerie Bertinelli came on the show specifically to learn more about her dad's father, Nazzareno Bertinelli. Born in Italy, he lived with Valerie Bertinelli's family when she was growing up in the U.S., and died of an illness when she was still a girl.
First, Valerie Bertinelli learned that her grandmother wasn't her grandfather's first wife.
As it turns out, he first married to a woman named Domenica Cellerani back in his Italian hometown. The wedding took place soon after he returned from the front in WWI.
“Whoa, wait, that's not (my grandmother,” the actor said after reading Domenica Cellerani's name.
The marriage was short-lived, however: In December 1922, the groom boarded a ship for the U.S. just a week after saying "I do."
On his immigration paperwork, Nazzareno Bertinelli listed himself as single and didn't acknowledge his marriage to Cellerani.
"What the heck? What is he doing?" Valerie Bertinelli said.
Gates explained that it was common at the time for couples to live in separate counties while one of them sought work. Based on the paperwork, however, it appeared that 24-year-old Nazzareno Bertinelli was embarking on a new life in a different country. His paperwork listed the length of time he planned to stay in the U.S.: "Always."
The plot thickened when Valerie Bertinelli discovers that Cellerani gave birth to Nazzareno Bertinelli’s son, Ernesto Bertinelli, seven months after her husband departed for Scranton, Pennsylvania.
"Oh, I wish I would've met him," the actor said.
Valerie Bertinelli's half uncle died in 2004. Gates said Ernesto Berinelli tried to connect with his American family by writing letters to them. It doesn't appear that he ever met his father or his half-brother.
“I wonder if that ... really bothered (Ernesto)," she replied.
"It would’ve bothered me," Gates said.
"I'm sad for the pain that they went through, the sadness, the feeling of not being lovable enough to keep your father there, which isn’t true but yet that's what a child goes to when a child is abandoned," she said of Ernesto.
Eight years after Nazzareno Bertinelli moved to the U.S., he applied for a marriage license with Angelina Bertinelli and listed that he had no prior marriages. When asked if she thinks her grandmother knew about her husband's first marriage, Valerie Bertinelli said, "No, I don't think she knew."
“I don't think this would've made him the most desirable bachelor floating around Scranton, Pennsylvania in 1930," Gates said in agreement.
Valerie Bertinelli said that she has "so many questions" that remain unanswered, but that she's trying to think about her ancestors with empathy rather than judgment.
“What I really am doing in earnest right now is to have no judgment because I don't know what was going on with Nazzareno. I know that his life was incredibly difficult. I don't know if Domenica brought him joy. I don’t know if Nazzareno brought Domenica joy. But they had a beautiful little boy Ernesto who seems to me wanted to reach out and spread some of his love. So that all can't be bad," she said.